Matt Bomer on Montgomery Clift: ‘He had to deal with so many things that we don’t have to deal with as much these days’

Whether or not Matt Bomer ends up playing screen icon Montgomery Clift in a biopic that’s in the works, the actor has long felt connected to him.

‘I kind of saw myself in him,’ Bomer tells People.com. ‘Even as a young kid – before obviously I knew anything about him, or even myself – I saw him on screen and I thought, “Oh wow he actually looks a lot like my brother.”‘

HBO is attached to the project about the closeted star of such classics as A Place In the Sun, The Young Lions and From Here to Eternity.

But the screenplay is still being worked on and no production start date has been announced.

‘It’s a hard story to tell, which is why we haven’t had his biopic yet,’ Bomer explains. ‘But it’s going great. It’s in development. We’re just not going to make that movie unless it’s the right movie and it’s told right and done right.’

Clift was just 45 when he died in 1966 and spent his career hiding from the public the fact that he was gay.

‘He had to deal with so many things that we don’t have to deal with as much these days. So I thought it was an important story for people to remember,’ Bomer says.

The actor has been able to have a thriving career as an openly gay man who is married with three children. His career had already been on an upwards trajectory with the TV series White Collar when he came out publicly in 2012.

Since then, he’s been nominated for an Emmy and won a Globe for the HBO film The Normal Heart, appeared in the film Magic Mike and its sequel, is currently starring in American Horror Story: Hotel and has roles in the upcoming feature films The Nice Guys and The Magnificent Seven.

Bomer hopes the movie gets made so younger generations can appreciate the great star whose roles also included The Misfits, The Heiress, Raintree County and Judgment at Nuremberg.

‘It’s crazy how many people I talk to, especially under 30, who don’t know who Montgomery Clift is. What? I feel like someone is responsible for letting people know how important he was – culturally, socially, but most importantly as an artist.’